The best plant nurseries in Sydney

The Royal Botanic Gardens is a great place to get lost and if you’ve ever meandered a little too far beyond the succulent garden you may have stumbled across the rows of seedlings in their publicly accessible nursery. Specialising in natives, you can pick up a baby plant propagated by volunteers from the garden’s living collection for as little as $2.50, smug in the knowledge that you are the parent of a rare botanical species. The money raised from the nursery goes back into the garden’s conservation efforts too. Extra smug points.

This tiny shop front on a corner opposite the National Art School packs a lot of  lush greenery into very limited space. The savvy use of footpath and tight interior serve to demonstrate just how much jungle you can fit into inner-city abodes and it’s hard to resist wanting to replicate the store’s set-up in your bedroom. The range of  indoor and outdoor plants is extensive but curated and the personable service makes this a confident purchase point for tentative gardeners without a garden. It’s also perfect for last minute gifts, with tasteful ceramic pots and a focus on low-fuss indoor leaves.

This a mega-market for plant hunters, they have all the supplies, soils and accessories you need alongside native and exotic seedlings, fruit and veg starters, and full grown trees. The prices are also lower than most bigger nurseries and there’s an on site café for injecting caffeine into your botanical excursion. The Flower Power at Enfield may have a pet store an on site bird aviary, but head to the mascot outpost for regular terrarium and succulent workshops as well as info sessions on how to care for your flora mates.

This nursery’s cartoon butterfly adorned walls are hard to miss if you’re driving through St Peters and beyond the mascot’s euphoric glare lies a thriving selection of flowering pots, seedlings and healthy full grown plants. Butterfly Blooms is a family run business and the staff boast over thirty years of experience in advising the plant lovers of Sydney. It’s also only an 8 minute walk from Sydenham station, so if you’re car-less this is a great place to pick up a transportable succulent or bonsai from their extensive range and carry it home on the train.

On the posher end of the neighbourhood nursery scale, Garden Life is all about landscaping with an aesthetic edge. The pots, water features and ornamental accoutrements here are beautiful  and, if you can afford it, you could be sashaying through an IRL lifestyle magazine shoot in your own home. The perfect place to pick up that camera-ready monstera deliciosa for the corner of the lounge room or  find a cool antique brass planter for that plastic clad cactus you’ve been ignoring in your yard. Garden Life also has design and installation services so you can skip the hard yakka and pay them to stylishly spiff up your garden without lifting a thumb.

If you're not local to Campbelltown, Tim’s is worth the drive for entertainment alone. This nursery has a resident pig statue that sits out the front and shares its thoughts on a giant sign for passers by to enjoy. Tim Pickles is the ‘Tim’ of this horticultural marketplace and he plies the public with his own specialty magic potting mix and even has a signature breed of fruit fly resistant tomato you can nab seedlings of. Plants come in great batch deals (four native seedlings for $20) and the selections are divided into zones for perusing with ease.

Located in both Bondi Junction and Mosman the Honeysuckle nurseries are certainly doing something right as they collect as many industry awards as they have plants. The business has been running in some incarnation since 1977 so you know you’re in good hands when enquiring about the longevity of your new green acquisition. They have a great range of species and a section with the most chic ‘luxury hoses’ we’ve ever encountered. The staff are trained in pest and disease diagnosis also, and you’re welcome to bring in pictures of your ailing plant or forensic samples of suffering leaves for a check-up.